New 14-Membered Cyclopeptide Alkaloids from Zizyphus oxyphylla Edgew

Two new 14-membered cyclopeptide alkaloids, Oxyphylline B (4) and Oxyphylline C (5), along with three known 13-membered cyclopeptide alkaloids, were isolated from stem and roots of Zizyphus oxyphylla Edgew. The compounds were tested for antibacterial activity. Oxyphylline B (4) showed comparatively better antibacterial activities against Escherichia coli (MIC, 5 μg/mL) than other compounds. This compound also exhibited weak antimicrobial activities against Staphylococcus aureus (MIC, 25 μg/mL), Pseudomonas aeruginosa (MIC, 50 μg/mL) and Salmonella typhi (MIC, 50 μg/mL).     

Mixed Convection of Water at 4 °C Along a Wedge with Variable Surface Temperature in a Porous Medium

In this study, the mixed convection of water at 4 °C along a wedge in a porous medium is investigated numerically using a finite difference method. To explore the effect of mixed convection, both forced and free convection-dominated regimes are considered. Non-similarity solutions are obtained for the variable walltemperature boundary condition. Velocity and temperature profiles as well as local dimensionless skin friction and the Nusselt number are obtained and compared with available numerical results for various values of different parameters. The wedge angle geometry parameter m and mixed convection parameter ξ ranged from 0 to 1 in both regimes, whereas different values of λ are considered for the purpose of comparison of heat transfer results.     

Novel multi-convolutional neural network fusion approach for smile recognition

Multimedia Tools and Applications - The smile is one of the most common human facial expressions encountered in our daily lives. Smile recognition can be used in many scenarios, such as emotion...     

Proteins in renal stones and urine of stone formers

The iron status of a national sample of adults living in France and participating in the SU.VI.MAX cohort, was assessed using serum ferritin and hemoglobin concentrations. Complete data were obtained for 6648 women 35-60 y old and for 3283 men 45-60 y old. Assessment of iron dietary intakes was realized on a subsample of 3111 women and 2337 men who reported six 24 h dietary records during a one-year period; 22.7% of menstruating women and 5.3% of post-menopausal women presented a total depletion of iron stores (serum ferritin < 15 microg/l). Iron-deficient anemias were found in, respectively, 4.4% and less than 1% of these women. Three-quarters of the anemias were related to iron deficiency in menstruating women. In men, iron depletion and iron deficiency anemia were very rare. Post-menopausal women had much higher serum ferritin levels than menstruating women. In menstruating women, those using intrauterine devices had significantly lower serum ferritin levels than those without contraception, and much lower than those using oral contraception. The frequency of iron depletion reached 28.1% in women using intrauterine devices, but only 13.6% in those using oral contraceptives. The mean iron intake was 16.7 +/- 5.7 mg/d in men and 12.3 +/- 3.4 mg/d in women. Heme iron represented respectively, 11.1 and 10.4% of iron intake. Ninety-three percent of menstruating women had dietary iron intakes lower than recommended dietary allowances (RDA); 52.6% consumed less than two thirds of these RDA. In post-menopausal women and men, respectively 27.7% and 3.6% had dietary intakes lower than RDA. Serum ferritin was positively correlated with meat, fish and total iron intake, and negatively correlated with dietary products consumption, calcium and fiber intake.     

Multilink Solution for Seamless Transition Between Multicast and Unicast Areas in 5G Core Network

Wireless Personal Communications - The exponential growth in technology observed over the past decade has introduced newer ways to exploit network and cyber-physical system-related vulnerabilities....     

Impact of visual saliency on multi-distorted blind image quality assessment using deep neural architecture

Multimedia Tools and Applications - No-referenceimage quality assessment (NR-IQA) techniques try to assess the quality of images without anyinformation regarding the pristine version of the image....     

On visual complexity of 3D shapes

We present an approach to compute the perceived complexity of a given 3D shape using the similarity between its views. Previous studies on 3D shape complexity relied on geometric and/or topological properties of the shape and are not appropriate for incorporating results from human shape perception which claim that humans perceive 3D shapes as organizations of 2D views. Therefore, we base our approach to computing 3D shape complexity on the (dis)similarity matrix of the shape's 2D views. To illustrate the application of our approach, we note that simple shapes lead to similar views whereas complex ones result in different, dissimilar views. This reflected in the View Similarity Graph (VSG) of a shape as tight clusters of points if the shape is simple and increasingly dispersed points as it gets more complex. To get a visual intuition of the VSG, we project it to 2D using Multi-Dimensional Scaling (MDS) and introduce measures to compute shape complexity through point dispersion in the resulting MDS plot. Experiments show that results obtained using our measures alleviate some of the drawbacks present in previous approaches.     

Service based meta-model for the development of distributed embedded real-time systems

The development complexity of Distributed Embedded Real-Time Systems (DERTS) can be reduced by the use of Service-Oriented Computing (SOC). However, the existing modeling methods allow modeling of either DERTS or SOC concepts and there is a lack of meta-model for Service-Oriented development of DERTS. This paper proposes a service-based meta-model for DERTS, along with the constraints of the elements of the meta-model. A Smart Home case study was designed to validate the meta-model. This meta-model could not only be beneficial for Service-Oriented development of DERTS, but can also be used at the Platform Independent Model (PIM) level of MDD.     

Fabrication and Characterization of Matrix-Type Transdermal Patches Loaded with Ramipril and Repaglinide Through Cellulose-based Hydrophilic and Hydrophobic Polymers: In Vitro and Ex Vivo Permeation Studies

Transdermal patches loaded with ramipril and repaglinide were prepared with the ambition to develop matrix-type transdermal drug delivery system for enhanced permeability and hence improved bioavailability. Different formulations were designed by intermittent concentrations of hydroxypropyl methylcellulose K4M as hydrophilic polymer and ethyl cellulose as hydrophobic polymer. Solvent casting method was used for the fabrication of transdermal patches. Oleic acid and propylene glycol were used to enhance permeability along with polyethylene glycol 400 as plasticizer. Newly designed patches were then evaluated for various physicochemical and mechanical properties. Compatibility studies were performed by Fourier transformed infrared spectroscopy which did not reveal any interaction between drug and polymers. Crystalline nature of drugs was confirmed when they were subjected to X-ray diffraction study and surface morphological studies using scanning electron microscopy. Transdermal patches were of good mechanical strength with folding endurance of more than 300-fold and 100% flatness. Percent drug contents of ramipril and repaglinide ranged from 90 to 105%, i.e., analogous to official limits. In vitro and ex vivo permeation studies were executed using franz diffusion cell. The cumulative amount of drug permeated through skin was 55.22–112.72% for repaglinide and 73.14–91.46% for ramipril. The release behavior of the permeated drug was analyzed by the application of model-dependent approaches. The results showed that Korsmeyer–Peppas model was found to be dominating in most of the formulations and drugs followed diffusion mechanism. It could be concluded that hydroxypropyl methylcellulose K4M and ethyl cellulose has great potential for ramipril and repaglinide as a vector for transdermal drug delivery effectively because of the formation of smooth surfaces of patches, high folding endurance, and entrapment efficiency with the ability to release the drugs in sustained manner.